Born from a love of 3D printing creative technical architect, programer and father Paul Harter (opens in new tab) has created a way of replicating anything that can be made in the cult sandbox game Minecraft in physical form.
In general, designing objects for 3D printing depends on knowledge of CAD software - and even the simpler tools like Sketch up and 123D would be a stretch for children to use. However, Harter's children were already enjoying creating blocky objects in Minecraft, so he created Printcraft (opens in new tab) a script which can turn their creations in to an .stl file ready to be 3D printed.
After putting it online for others to use, the script has become a hit and people from around the world have been printing their Minecraft creations, both for the sake of having memorabilia and to understand and experiment with this emerging technology.
If your kids are into Minecraft and you have access to a 3D printer , go to eu1.printcraft.org to find out more.
Words: Chris Harries (opens in new tab)
Christian Harries (opens in new tab) is a final year product design student at Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication (opens in new tab).
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